S/O to that one anon on Tumblr.

This gon get gay asf.

A few miles from the encampment on the banks of the peaks of what would soon become their home, a ragtag bunch of soilders slogged the last few paces up the hill, collapsing in heaps near the gates. Everyone was bruised and broken and reeling from the battle weeks prior. Surgeons rushed back and forth from various individuals clutching their ribs and shaking from the pain of third degree burns.

Yet here they were. The inquisitior having commanded that they continue travelling, as though Haven were destroyed by dragons every other day.

Krem was a bit fucking sick of it.

He trailed miserably behind the last of the chargers, kicking stones up the slope as they went. His armor clinked irritatingly, sinking warmth from his skin from the setting in frost. He resisted the shivers that caused his muscles to tense more than they otherwise would. Everyone seemed okay. Even Dorian.

"Fuck Dorian." He thought aloud, sending another stone flying with the tip of his boot.
"Fuck the Inquisitor for making him arm a fucking trebuchet under a fucking dragon attack." Another stone went flying. Seriously, who needs a Tevinter mage for that?
"Fuck me for thinking he was going to die. Fuck him for nearly dying. Fuck the snow. Fuck hauling his ass back to camp. Fuck, fuck, fuck-" His boot caught on a stone and brought him to his knees, and he felt the leather scrape in protest. The chargers were long gone. He was perched on the side of a mountain, sulking from the embarrassment, the shame, the self-loathing that came with being pathetically, obsessively in love with someone who constantly tormented him with half glances and retracted statements. He'd heard men talk about the pain of being rejected by girls they barely knew, but oh god was this worse. Was this not a cruel joke on the part of the Maker, giving men the societal right to be close friends. Closing the gap between the two of them with shared jokes and awkward brushes of limbs then severing it with the fact that it was still, as many had been told before him, unprofessional to love ones fellow soilders.

Krem hadn't realized he was still on the mountainside. He fidgeted with the stones in front of him as he sat cross legged, feeling like tearing out his hair at the memory of how small Dorian had felt suspended against his chest as they trudged through the snow.

"Fuck it." He mumbled irritably, upset with his weakness. He hauled himself to his feet, and found himself face to face with the devil himself. Dorian looked blank, devoid of his usual glib charm. His arms hovered away from his side, his fingers tensioning instinctively as they locked eyes. Krem was certain that he saw the air tremble with heat between his fingers as he glanced away, swallowing.

"Lovely scenery for a mental breakdown." Dorian jabbed, his voice shaking a little bit despite his usual sarcasm. Krem felt his stomach flip in ways he wished it wouldn't.

"You're really a right place right time kind of guy, aren't you?" Krem said flatly. He was joking, but he couldn't help but wince at the accidental distain.

"Oh, this isn't us. Why are we so… Involved, all of a sudden? Are we really too tired for a bit of cheerful banter?" Dorian rambled on, in his run on sentences and vague hand gestures kind of way. Krem bit back a fraction of his upset; the proportion of which he was unsure of.

"Involved?" Krem said, his voice raising an octave with his distaste. "Who's involved? Just the person who carried you across a bloody mountain when you got knocked out by a dragon? Involved? Who could that possibly be?" He was going over the top now, in his usual way, his eyes lighting up a little bit like they did over a drink in the Tavern. He stepped closer to Dorian, shaking his head irritably. His arms spread with grandeur.

"Oh, no, not I, not the humble Krem, not the person who pretends to like wine just so that I have an excuse to talk to you. Not the person you give chills. Not the one I have to turn everything into a joke with so that you don't come around and realize that you're-" Krem paused mid gesture, understanding where he was going. Dorian took a step closer to him closing that invisible gap somewhat, smirking that terrible smirk, the same one that he'd smirked when he first woke up from a nasty cocktail of a concussion from an ogre and frostbite.

"I'm what, Krem?" He asked gently. "A really good bloke? A nice guy? A good friend? That's got to be it. The thing that you're constantly avoiding telling me is that I'm excellent company. A good friend. That's the one." Dorian folded his arms, staring at him almost too intently for comfort. Almost. If Krem didn't feed off moments like these. Thoughts rushed through his head once again.

Maybe he feels the same.

No, that's my imagination.

But look at him. There's something-

No. No. It doesn't work like that.

But of course, he scoffed, ignoring the way his heart beat faster at the pointed remark. Krem folded his arms in return. The space between them bristled with energy, no longer invisible.

"Oh. Just so great." Krem stammered uselessly, smoldered by Dorian's eyes. He felt his face flush. He felt like he was melting into a puddle at his feet. His folded arms had subconsciously turned into more of a fetal hug. Krem moved to add space, to go away, to storm off, whichever came first. Dorian closed it easily, filling the silence between Dorian's polite interest and Krem's averted eyes.

"I do know that you, shall we say, physically assaulted a guard who suggested we may be disguised demons trying to infiltrate the camp." Dorian said plainly, taking a step towards him. His arms fell weakly to his sides.

"You were-" He started.

"Yes. Semi conscious. Whoop de doo." Dorian said with what looked like the hint of a playful eyeroll. "I also know that you cried when-"

"Dorian." Krem said exasperatedly. He was used to being the annoying one. This was something else. "I never knew you to be the eaves dropping type." He said with mock disgust, a half hearted imitation of a caregiver that fell flatter, as jokes go, than he would have liked.

Surely he didn't remember the worst of it. "I also remember how you held my hand and told me there was something you had been keeping from me." Dorian said, clearing another step towards him, forcing Krem to glance up slightly. For all his strength and Dorian's skinniness, Dorian won out in height. Krem's mind was abuzz with worst case scenarios.

The electricity disappeared. They stood openly, Dorian's hands free and twitching, face genuine once again, devoid of rhetoric. Krem felt a hand brush his, their fingers entwining for a moment as the space between them closed. They were feet apart and Krem suddenly felt aware of him. His breath touched the side of his face and he felt the callouses on his hand before it fell to his waist, followed by another which ran through Krem's hair.

"I know that you nearly cried when all those surgeons fell upon me, trying to patch me up." Dorian said in not much more than a murmur. Dorian's bravery seemed to falter and cease where it stood. He shifted awkwardly, and Krem felt his hands loosen. And he knew that he wanted them to stay. He grabbed his hands as he retracted them, feeling them lock together beneath callouses on his fingers.

"It's you." He said, more forcefully than he intended initially. "It's you- you're everything I don't talk about." There was a beat, a pause, a sort of mutual realization that ended with them entangled. Krem's arms were thrown haphazardly around his neck, catching pieces of his face and hair that made the kiss feel a thousand times more tactile as he perched on his toes, supported by Dorian's arms. It was one of those moments where one is never sure how much time passed, or how much didn't at all. He felt like he was gathering breath after being winded, like an urge that he had tried so hard to suppress was being fulfilled. Dorian smiled between them, and they broke apart for a moment, their foreheads pressed together. Krem began to catch his breath, feeling Dorian all around him, his smell and the feeling of his robes and his breath against his nose. He panted and laughed shakily, as did Dorian as he held Krem tightly, as if he were afraid that if he let go it would be over. No longer swept up in a moment that belonged in one of Cassandra's books.

The pause waned, and Krem pulled himself close to his chest, welcomed by Dorian's tight grasp around the small of his back. He nestled into the space between his neck and his shoulder, feeling Dorian's heart beat loudly against his own. He felt more at home than he had in days.

"If this gets any more sweet I will vomit." Dorian chuckled, leaning his head against Krem's.

"I know." Krem laughed. "Let's go to the tavern."